It is my keen hope that we are energetic in this wonderful year, 2019.

In case you haven’t heard, the 2nd Africa Open Science and Hardware Summit will be held on April 10-13 at the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. We hope you and your community will be eager to meet like-minded people - a community of makers, hackers, practitioners, researchers, educators, government officials, and start-up innovators in science and technology primarily across the African continent and the global South.

Africa OSH is a grassroots effort that provides people interested in open science and hardware an alternative to traditional intellectual property (IP) and closed systems as a means to achieve locally adaptable technologies that will foster economic growth in Africa. We are also facilitating the creation of the first roadmap for Open Science & Hardware in Africa that will be refined in this year’s summit.

Last year, our event in Kumasi, Ghana catalysed the interaction of ~100 participants from 22 countries. Topics discussed ranged from citizen science, DIY Biology, open source technology, entrepreneurship, biosecurity, bioart, design, social science, and open access and publishing. Partnerships and new initiatives were born.

The local host for AfricaOSH 2019, STICLab (www.sticlab.co.tz), is a makerspace particularly focused on developing technical, scientific and engineering solutions to social and industrial problems, utilizing locally available resources as much as possible. Our venue host is UDICTI, the ICT Incubator at UDSM.

Over several days, participants will have opportunities to learn more about projects and initiatives across the continent, create space for exchange and collaboration through workshops, panels and sessions initiated by attendees.